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Schizophrenia
A general label for a number of psychotic disorders
with various cognitive, emotional, and behavioral manifestations. The term
originated with Eugen Bleuler, who offered it in 1911 as a replacement for
dementia praecox. It literally means splitting in the mind and was chosen by
Bleuler because the disorder seemed to reflect a cleavage or dissociation
between the functions of feeling or emotion on one hand and those of thinking or
cognition on the other. Although there are various distinguishable
schizophrenias certain features are taken as hallmarks of all:
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(a) deterioration from previous levels of social,
cognitive, and vocational functioning;
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(b) onset before the age of 45;
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(c) a duration of at least six months; and most
tellingly,
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(d) a pattern of psychotic features including
thought disturbances, bizarre delusions, hallucinations
(usually auditory), disturbed sense of self, and a loss of
reality testing.
The borderline that distinguishes schizophrenia
from other disorders is fuzzy, and differential diagnosis is problematical. Note
also that many authorities are convinced that a relatively straightforward
(although largely uniform) neurochemical cause exists for the disorder.
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